IN NIGERIA, THE LED HARASS THE LEADER TO STEAL PUBLIC FUNDS...TURNING HIS LIFE TO SHEER HELL IF DOESN'T!

Actions or inactions beget outcomes... The Nigerian has a way...almost an unwise knack....for not matching actions with outcomes...especially in matters of the polity. So, you.....the led... You always advocate for the dubious option whenever you need to make a choice....justfying the bad and the devious but villifying the rightious. You "praise and worship" whoever has money....even if he obtained that money anyway....anyhow. You are now very old....but the fact that your scalp reeks of grey hair matters little to you....and does not modify your opinions....or choices! You seek and snoop for opportunities to harass and nag your own son for choosing to be different...and forthright....and refusing to succumb to your admonition to "do things like others". Yet you are not the only fellow with such bents in behaviour! Many a theiving leader has a household of felons bullying him to dip his hands in the communal till....even if he meant to stay honest....ab initio! Nor did you preach your current sermons when rearing your son.....when you then insisted that stealing was wrong. Now you are determined to retrain him in his adult years....to pitch his tent with rogues....for this new option is the "realistic" option....for "survivors" in our clime! Your son often wonders aloud if you are truly Godly....or merely religious....as you attend virtually all church programmes. He prays that: "may you reap the fruits of your hands"....and asks you to say Amen. You never did! How can you? It's like placing a curse on your own head! Those of your ilk equally bully their sons....husbands....wives....friends....sisters....brothers....colleagues...to "take their own 'share' now they still have the opportunities...for this is "their time". You make the home hot and give them no peace until they do your bidding...to steal public funds! And as roads and hospitals and schools remain unbuilt.....and public electricity goes on and off a-yoyo....and you and yours lose your jobs...or your pension funds are pilfered....and food disappears from your tables, you are daft enough to complain! Because you cannot connect the "two"...the communal poverty....the lack of infrasructure.....the low human development index....the abysmmal quality of life....and the theivery you encourage! And try to enforce! Everyone is calling the leaders thieves and you join in. How dare you! I have just rendered a graphic description of my own mother. How about yours?! Or are you cutting corners already without any prompts?

NOW COMPARE....
I was just visiting this uncle who dared counsel me not to turn out like my father. Hear him: "When your father was their accountant at Nigerian Dredging, armed robbers paid them a "visit". Your father hid huge cash in his custody to forstall any theft and refused to agree to let us go bury it in our village. He then promptly released it to the company management after the robbers left!"

....And when I accosted our family head having been mandated by LASU authorities (years ago) to obtain pre-admission proof of indigenship for my daughter, our host had this to say as we dialogued: "You say you cannot pay kickbacks to people who refer patients to you? What is wrong in just showing 'appreciation' for referrals? That's how your father used to behave at 'Dredging'....always talking about his 'reputation'.....squandering all the 'chances' he had in that place!"

.....And as my host's voice rose in anger, I somehow eased myself out....

.....At least I had another parent to use as a yardstick.....

Dr Tosin Akindele is a Lagos-based Medical Practitioner, a former Secretary of AGPMPN Ikorodu zone, a former Secretary of the Quackery Committee of AGPMPN Lagos State Branch, founder of Analytical Minds, a good health advocate and social critic.